image: Brandon Brown is a a professor of social medicine, population, and public health in the UCR School of Medicine.
Credit: Stan Lim, UC Riverside.
RIVERSIDE, Calif. -- Brandon Brown, a professor of social medicine, population, and public health in the UCR School of Medicine, has been elected a 2025 Fellow of The Hastings Center, one of the most respected honors in the field of bioethics. Brown is the first Hastings Fellow ever elected from UC Riverside.
The Hastings Center fellowship recognizes individuals who have made exceptional contributions to the ethical dimensions of health, science, and public policy. Fellows are nominated and elected by current members in recognition of outstanding accomplishments, leadership, and public impact.
“Professor Brown’s election honors not only his own achievements but also the stature of UC Riverside as a place that fosters ethical innovation and public-minded scholarship,” said Bruce Link, a distinguished professor of sociology and public policy at UCR who worked with Brown on a health disparities research project funded by the National Institutes of Health. “His body of work exemplifies the kind of ethical inquiry and public engagement that Hastings seeks to honor.”
Brown’s work focuses on the ethical conduct of community-partnered research in HIV prevention and care, with a special emphasis on health equity, stigma, and social justice. His scholarship brings together academic rigor and community collaboration — values at the heart of UCR’s mission.
He has authored more than 200 publications and contributed to key national and international guidance documents, including the HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN) Ethics Guidance (2020) and the National Academy of Medicine’s report on improving representation in clinical research.
At UCR, Brown is recognized as a mentor, collaborator, and advocate for justice-centered public health research. His work extends globally through leadership roles with partners in Peru and other international research sites.
He also serves as board chair of TruEvolution, a nonprofit dedicated to advancing health equity and racial justice for LGBTQ+ communities. In 2021, he was selected as an Emerging Leaders in Health and Medicine Scholar by the National Academy of Medicine.
Brown is one of only 13 researchers elected 2025 Hastings Center Fellows.
“Our new fellows are addressing some of the most urgent issues of our time, including reproductive ethics, transplant research, and public health, and are working throughout the world,” said Hastings Center President Vardit Ravitsky. “We are thrilled to have them join our community.”
The Hastings Center, founded in 1969, is the world’s first and most influential bioethics institute. Its fellows are a distinguished group of scholars, clinicians, and leaders who have shaped national and international conversations about health, science, and ethics.
| The University of California, Riverside is a doctoral research university, a living laboratory for groundbreaking exploration of issues critical to Inland Southern California, the state and communities around the world. Reflecting California's diverse culture, UCR's enrollment is more than 26,000 students. The campus opened a medical school in 2013 and has reached the heart of the Coachella Valley by way of the UCR Palm Desert Center. The campus has an annual impact of more than $2.7 billion on the U.S. economy. To learn more, visit www.ucr.edu. |